Ethan Ruan (阮經天) and Tiffany Hsu (許瑋甯) are an on-again off-again couple that people just love to talk about, probably because Ruan always seem on the verge of going off the rails with yet another bimbo. The couple were spotted by Apple Daily down in Kenting last weekend, and while they continue to strenuously deny that they are together, Hsu was sporting a contraceptive patch with her black bikini, which had the expected effect of whipping up media curiosity, and the two where tracked down to a guesthouse they were sharing. Apple Daily thought this shockingly inconsiderate behavior on the part of Ruan and Hsu, especially when they try so hard to avoid the media spotlight in Taipei. The fashionable pair also got their stories in a muddle when questioned by the media after taking to the stage this week at Paul Smith and Ferragamo catwalk shows. This all seems rather disingenuous given Ruan’s reputation and his long association with Hsu, but the Apple Daily is relentless, to misquote the Air Supply song, in “making news out of nothing at all.”
Chen Chu-he (陳楚河), a co-star with Ruan on the hit TV series To Love You Is My Destiny (命中注定我愛你), is also keeping the paparazzi busy at all hours of the night. Chen has been getting plenty of coverage for his recent, tempestuous liaison with Ella Chen (陳嘉樺) of the girl-group S.H.E, but now his attention seems to have turned to the abundantly endowed lingerie model Wang Yu-fei (王毓菲), better known as Hsiung Hsiung (熊熊). For the record, Wang is said to have a 32F cup-size, and Next magazine suggests that this is more than sufficient reason for Chen’s change of heart. Wang is said to be generous with her charms, and according to Next she is a well-known presence on the Internet, appearing in various photo sites. A delightful image of Wang holding a NT$50 piece between her pendulous protuberances, one of many images on www.g-years.com, a Web forum, is recommended for anyone who shares Next magazine’s breast fixation.
Carrying on the theme of the body beautiful, Coco Chiang’s (蔣怡) success in the basketball romance Hot Shot (籃球火) is helping make the bronzed look more popular in white skin-obsessed Taiwan. Dark skin began to register on the style charts with the appearance of Guatemalan-Taiwanese model Liz Yang’s (楊莉思) and her involvement with singer David Tao (陶吉吉), and is being reinforced by the relentless barrage of images of Janet Hsieh (謝怡芬), host of Fun Taiwan, whose career has blossomed recently following her romance with her manager Li Ching-bai (李景白).
While Pop Stop is sure that the spike in Hsieh’s exposure it due totally to natural talent, there are others in the entertainment industry who seem less coy about getting a little help from a friend. Little Pan-pan (小潘潘) has been having something of a rough time recently, what with getting busted for drugs last November — she was cleared but her name got dragged through the mud — then the show she was hosting, Videoland’s The Incredible World (不可思議的世界) got the chop. To console herself, she spent NT$200,000 at the plastic surgeons before the Lunar New Year, and has now just moved into a new apartment costing nearly NT$30 million. Next magazine suggests that it is an endorsement contract from Q.T. Skin (六員環有限公司) owned by “close friend” Yen Chien-cheng (嚴健誠), that is keeping the wolf from Little Pan-pan’s door.
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
A sultry sea mist blankets New Taipei City as I pedal from Tamsui District (淡水) up the coast. This might not be ideal beach weather but it’s fine weather for riding –– the cloud cover sheltering arms and legs from the scourge of the subtropical sun. The dedicated bikeway that connects downtown Taipei with the west coast of New Taipei City ends just past Fisherman’s Wharf (漁人碼頭) so I’m not the only cyclist jostling for space among the SUVs and scooters on National Highway No. 2. Many Lycra-clad enthusiasts are racing north on stealthy Giants and Meridas, rounding “the crown coast”
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and